LOCKED up, abandoned, desolate.
Once welcoming, loved and alive, these sorry sites plague the landscape and anger locals who would love nothing more than to see them transformed into new homes.
Adding fuel to their frustration is the growing number of proposed developments coming in for green fields in Humberston and New Waltham – which accounts for 45 per cent of future housing developments needed by 2030.
These sites attract vandals as easily as the green fields seem to be attracting developers but if taken on, together, they could provide 440 houses – and they are just a snapshot of the tens of brownfield sites in Grimsby and Cleethorpes that are begging to be resurrected.
North East Lincolnshire Council is currently drawing up a new local plan, which includes deciding where new housing should be built and what land should be protected. They are also identifying land for new houses to be built on over the next five years.
Head of development at North East Lincolnshire Council, Jason Longhurst, said: "The Council must identify land locally for at least five years of new house building. We have in recent years been unable to do this, even when brownfield land, assessed as ready to be built on, is taken into account. This is why it may be necessary to allow greenfield land to be built on, subject to some rigorous criteria being satisfied."
According to the Countryside Alliance, the rural population has grown at twice the rate of urban areas due to people moving from the city. This has driven up house prices, which often means people who have lived in rural communities all their lives, cannot afford to live there.
As reported, the Save Our Fields action group is fighting many developments planned for green fields in Humberston and New Waltham, including: Keystone Developments' 400 homes, Millennium Parks' 400 home development and 110 homes on the former golf course, all in Humberston Avenue. They are also against the 1,500 home 'urban extension' planned for Weelsby Hall Farm land at Hewitt's Circus and the 150 homes planned for neighbouring land on Humberston Road, Grimsby.
Save Our Fields campaigner and developer, Dieter Nelson, has just been granted permission to build three homes in Neptune Street, Cleethorpes on brownfield sites – despite them being in a flood risk area.
He said: "Some brownfield sites do have constraints, however there is normally a design solution to provide acceptable mitigation, as in the case of Neptune Street development. The granting of these smaller brownfield sites adds to NELC's housing targets and should reduce the pressure of releasing larger greenfield sites outside development boundaries. The development of the site creates betterment to the area by removing an untidy parcel of land which currently attracts anti social behaviour."
The old Cherry Valley factory, at the end of Pelham Road, in Cleethorpes, which is surrounded by flooded concrete, is available for development and described by neighbours as an "eye sore".
A neighbour who does not want to be named said: "Kids keep going in it, the roof has collapsed. I want to see a row of houses there, everyone does. It is just an eyesore that attracts vandals, rats, mice and seaguls. It would be great if lovely homes were built there with lots of nice people living there."
Mr Longhurst added: "In the current economic climate some brownfield sites are proving difficult to develop.
"My officers do continue to meet with landowners and developers to look at how we can support development on these sites."
